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November 21, 2008

If you are in Toronto this weekend and coming week, check-out the Alphabet City Festival. This year’s theme is Fuel. Organized around the recently published bookFuel, the Alphabet City festival will have a cabaret performance tonight (Thursday Nov 27th) at 8pm, an exhibition which opens on Nov. 27th and a book launch on the 28th.

Vaclav Smil, author of many books with us, has an op-ed on energy in the November/December issue of The American, the magazine of the American Enterprise Institute. In his piece, "Moore’s Curse and the Great Energy Delusion," Smil throws some cold water on the idea that the U.S. can quickly execute a move away from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Here's a taste:

The historical verdict is unassailable: because of the requisite
technical and infrastructural imperatives and because of numerous (and
often entirely unforeseen) socio-economic adjustments, energy
transitions in large economies and on a global scale are inherently
protracted affairs. That is why, barring some extraordinary commitments
and actions, none of the promises for greatly accelerated energy
transitions will be realized, and during the next decade none of the
new energy sources and prime movers will make a major difference by
capturing 20 percent to 25 percent of its respective market.

November 17, 2008

Cognet - the Press's online destination for the cognitive science and neuroscience communities - has expanded its online library, adding 38 new books from the neuroscience and cognitive science collections. In addition, the look and navigability of the site has been improved, with cleaner, more accessible features and a new logo.

Cognet now offers over 480 titles from leading figures in the field, providing a superior resource for the brain and cognitive research community. Some of Cognet’s newly acquired titles include:

In this volume, the third in a trilogy, Turkle combines memoir, clinical writings, and ethnography to draw new perspectives on the experience of technology. Her personal stories illuminate howtechnology enters the inner life.

This event is sponsored by authors@mit, a lecture series cosponsored by MIT Libraries and The MIT Press Bookstore. Its open to the public, free, and wheelchair accessible. Click here for a map. For more information call (617) 253-5249, email authors@mit.edu, or visit the MIT Press Bookstore.

Glenn Loury, the first, tenured African American Professor in the
Economics Department at Harvard University (he's now at Brown and the author of Race, Incarceration, and the American Experience) and the Anneberg School's Kathleen Hall Jamieson spoke with Bill Moyers on Friday night about the election cycle and issues surrounding it.

On this historic election day, we thought this thoughtful and intelligent summation might be worth a second look.